Supreme Court appoints former CAG Vinod Rai to head BCCI

Tue, 31 Jan 2017 11:01:31 IST

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday appointed a committee of four administrators headed by former Comptroller and Auditor General Vinod Rai to manage the affairs of world's richest cricket body BCCI after its president and other top office bearers were barred from cricket administration.

A bench of Justices Dipak Misra, A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud directed that the committee - also comprising eminent cricket historian Ramachandra Guha, CEO & MD of Infrastructure Development Finance Company (IDFC) Vikram Limaye and former Indian women cricket captain Diana Edulji - would supervise the management of BCCI and CEO of the Board would report to the panel.

The court selected the administrators out of the names suggested by senior advocates Gopal Subramaniam and Anil Divan, who are assisting the court as amicus curiae and names recommended by state associations.

The bench turned down the plea of the Centre which contended that Secretary of Ministry of Sports be also nominated as an administrator, saying that its earlier verdict had barred ministers and bureaucrats from holding any post in BCCI and it could not appoint him in violation of apex court's earlier order.

After a three-year long legal proceedings during which the apex court granted numerous opportunity to BCCI and state cricket associations to bring reforms in cricket administration, the Court finally entrusted the task to inject transparency and accountability in cricket management to the panel.

The court started hearing the case on cricket reform in March 2014 when the allegation of betting and spot fixing in IPL 2013 came to light but the SC expanded the ambit of the hearing and appointed Justice R M Lodha committee to overhaul the cricket administration in the country.